Chapter 175: Pinhh's First Mega-Promotion: 1.7 Billion in Sales from the Collaboration with Jingdong

On the day of Double Twelve, Taobao and Jingdong went all out competing, the battle fierce.

Taobao shouted the slogan "National Frenzy Grab Festival," everything 50% off with free shipping, and Zhifubao also rolled out a "Top up 100, get 100 back" promotion.

Ma Liyun's calculations were shrewd: taking Mama Ali's marketing budget to promote his own Zhifubao, wanting to boost this payment tool's market share.

Even regular online shoppers instinctively distrusted a third-party payment app like Zhifubao.

Most people paid with online banking, or transferred a few dozen yuan into their Zhifubao account, topped up again after spending it.

But Ma Liyun had high hopes for Zhifubao and naturally didn't want to sit around waiting for users to come, so at this Double Twelve event, he switched on "money-throwing" mode.

Chen Yansen topped up 100 yuan into his Zhifubao account, and Taobao immediately credited a 100-yuan cash red packet; aside from being unusable on virtual products, there weren't many restrictions.

When a single purchase was greater than or equal to 100 yuan, this cash-back red packet could be used, but each person could only participate once.

This is no different from giving it away free!

During the event, there were 120,000 slots in total; this one item alone burned 12 million yuan.

Chen Yansen, who had seen plenty of internet involution, couldn't help clicking his tongue—no wonder that a few years later, netizens shamelessly called Ma Liyun "daddy."

This promotion method was simple and wildly lavish.

Not much money, but extremely effective!

Jingdong wasn't about to be outdone either, putting together a "white goods, apparel, beauty" marketing slogan: cabbage-price flash sale of a Smart car with a market price of 115,000 yuan; offering extended product warranties, on-site repair and other upgraded services; arranging beautiful female couriers to deliver to the door for buyers in first-tier cities.

Additionally, 20-yuan, 30-yuan, and 50-yuan no-threshold Jing coupons were placed in a prominent spot on the main venue, available in limited quantities on the hour.

With Jingdong's user base at this time, aside from the 50-yuan ones being a bit tricky, the 20- and 30-yuan ones could basically be grabbed and used anytime, no challenge at all.

In terms of marketing plans, Jingdong and Taobao's tactics were simple and brute-force!

As for Pinhh's promotional copy, it was actually very concise.

Shop on Pinhh, every day is Double Eleven; shop on Pinhh, shop smarter!

On top of the original features, the product added a Hundred-Billion Subsidy channel.

Its position was right in the center of the app's home screen, and on the PC side, in the upper-middle of the webpage, with single-day exposure UV reaching 20 million.

The products here were all hand-picked, then filtered through a price-comparison system to ensure they were the lowest prices across the entire web.

In addition, the event team also set up 5-yuan and 10-yuan no-threshold coupons, as well as 20, 30, 50, 100, 500, and 1000-yuan spend-discount red packets.

The promotional intensity couldn't compare to Jingdong and Taobao, but in terms of discounts on individual event items, it was even more powerful.

But e-commerce mega-promotions of this era hadn't yet developed into the college-entrance-exam-level difficulty of later years; complex marketing tools like shop coupons, single-item coupons, multi-item discounts, brand gold, category red packets, and universal red packets had mostly yet to appear.

When shopping, people only checked if there was a shop coupon—if there was, they'd grab one on the way; if not, they'd jump over from New Fox Taobao, save a few yuan in cashback, and complete the order happily satisfied.

Compared to a decade or more later, both platforms and merchants were more honest.

There were tricks, but not many.

Chen Yansen stood up, walked to the window, and looked toward Building 6 across the way, brightly lit.

This was Pinhh's first mega-promotion!

Everyone took it extra seriously!

They planned to wait until that day's performance numbers came out before clocking off, so the admin department had booked a hotel long ago.

Chen Yansen pushed the door open, took the elevator down to the first floor, and walked toward Building 6.

The early-winter wind howled, the weather growing colder.

Besides Pinhh and Sister Chengzi Tech, the tech park had a few other companies, but they had all clocked out by now, their office buildings pitch black.

Chen Yansen had just reached the second floor when he heard a customer-service rep excitedly shouting: "Got it! This 100-yuan Zhifubao red packet—if your hands aren't fast enough, you really can't get one!"

"Jingjing, you're amazing, help me grab one too, I didn't get either round."

Another customer-service rep said, face full of dejection, hurriedly asking for help.

"Sure, give me your account." Tian Jing squinted her eyes and cheerfully agreed without hesitation.

Chen Yansen's forehead crawled with black lines; he shook his head helplessly and said nothing.

For these eighteen- or nineteen-year-old college students, the chance to easily earn 100 yuan was indeed hard to refuse.

Although the topped-up 100-yuan balance couldn't be withdrawn and could only be used for shopping, some Taobao shop owners had already been privately promoting in shopping groups that they could help users "cash out" at 85% of face value.

Chen Yansen continued forward and arrived at the merchant-acquisition team's work area.

"Sen-ge!"

"Boss!"

The ones shouting "Sen-ge" were Zhang Yifeng, Li Hui, and Yuan Wei; the merchant-acquisition staff who joined later all called Chen Yansen "Boss."

Chen Yansen gave a slight nod and acknowledged them.

He then pulled over a chair, sat down, and asked Zhang Yifeng: "How did the Xiyue fruit sell?"

"27,000 orders of sugar tangerines, 190,000 orders of Emperor tangerines. The local agricultural association said the kumquats, Orah mandarins, and sugarcane next spring will all be handed to Pinhh to sell."

Zhang Yifeng answered with a smile.

Earlier, he and Yuan Wei and Li Hui had spent over half a month in Xiyue, relying on the eye-catching navel-orange results to smoothly convince the surrounding big fruit growers.

When they returned to Xucheng, their suitcases were stuffed full of contracts.

"After Double Eleven wraps up, spend more time running business at the digital and home-appliance industry belts in Shencheng. Contact Teacher Cao before you go. Pinhh and Taobao are positioned differently; we have to go deep into the source factories to skip middlemen, get the best prices, and build a product advantage."

Chen Yansen patted Zhang Yifeng on the shoulder and gave earnest instructions.

In his view, if Pinhh wanted to break into the top three of e-commerce—or even take first place—relying solely on Penguin's traffic, group-buying fission, and bargain-hunting for new users simply wouldn't be enough.

The real core was: focus on the lower-tier markets and identify target users; strengthen supply chain management to build a stable supply-side advantage; optimize logistics and delivery processes to improve efficiency and reduce costs.

Yunsu was his hidden move; partnering with industry belts was his open move.

"Sen-ge, don't worry, I understand." Zhang Yifeng nodded heavily.

During this period, he had also come to understand the difference between doing merchant acquisition at Fox Taobao and doing it at Pinhh.

In the past at Fox Taobao, when he contacted merchants he could only reach the operations, store manager, or online lead level—he couldn't get anywhere near brand owners, factories, or industry-belt resources.

Just like a 399-yuan air fryer, with Fox Tao setting a 60% commission, he still worried the merchant would lose money.

Now he knew the factory price of an air fryer was less than 60 yuan.

Last week, a merchant recruiter from the home appliances group, originally a category manager for Store No. 1, negotiated with a factory in Cixi for a 99-yuan air fryer with free shipping.

Only three days after launch, it sold a terrifying 370,000 orders, completely selling out a month's production capacity of the factory.

For this Double Twelve, they worked three shifts to rush out 200,000 units; any excess sales had to be changed to pre-orders.

Chen Yansen chatted a few more words with Yuan Wei and Li Hui.

Before long, several young ladies from the administration department came up carrying big and small bags of KFC.

"One portion for everyone! There's pizza, barbecue, and hot pot coming up behind; this is just the appetizer!"

Xu Xingxing shouted from the stairwell entrance.

Hearing this, the people on the second floor gathered around with smiles.

Chen Yansen stood up and was about to leave when he saw Song Yuncheng approaching, so he waved to her.

The two took drinks and sat down in the terrace rest area.

"The Chery e5 sold 734 units, the Aux one-horsepower air conditioner sold 12,475 units, the Ya-Meng beauty device sold 3,278 pieces, and the 43-degree Feitian Maotai sold 1,945 orders..."

As soon as Song Yuncheng sat down, she began talking about the sales of the merchants she was responsible for today.

"Then Director Song's commission next month must be substantial; do you want to treat me to a meal at Mingli?"

Chen Yansen swirled his drink and asked with a smile.

"No." Song Yuncheng's face flushed, and she refused quite bluntly.

Treating someone to a meal was nothing, but once Chen Yansen returned to the hotel, he would torment her in all sorts of ways.

Those messy techniques, every time she thought of them, made Song Yuncheng so embarrassed that her ears turned red.

"Then I'll treat you," Chen Yansen said with a smile.

"The moon is quite round," Song Yuncheng turned her head, deliberately changing the subject.

"You're quite round too," Chen Yansen teased.

Following his gaze until she saw the final landing spot, Song Yuncheng understood Chen Yansen's meaning and gave him a coquettish, disdainful glance.

At this moment, far away in Yanjing, Liu Qiangdong was also not off work.

He sat in his office, staring intently at the real-time sales data for the day, and breathed a sigh of relief when the sales figure broke 1 billion.

You see, Jingdong's entire Double Eleven only sold 1.06 billion, and the traffic for Double Twelve was far less than Double Eleven; it was only 8 PM now, with 4 hours remaining until the end of the big promotion.

"By the way, I still don't know how much Jingdong sold on Pinba?"

Thinking of this, Liu Qiangdong found the report link sent by the data center and clicked into it.

Upon seeing the summary number at the very top, his face stiffened, and he immediately felt awkward.

Of Jingdong's 1 billion in sales, the channel from Pinba accounted for 16%, nearly two-tenths.

Pinba has been online for less than a month; how many daily active users does it actually have?

(End of this chapter)